Hidden Data

[Guest]

After having uninstalled certain software program, erased partition, reformatted, reinstalled windows, and reinstalled software, it detects a previous installation. How's it possible for data to still exist?
I'm using Win98SE.

 

[Guest]

do you have a second hard drive hooked up to the system with data on it, or a second partition with data on it?? Also, are you making the partition the exact same size as before when you delete the partition and format. The only way to get rid of data on a hard completely is with a program written to do so. This is why they can catch child-pornography idiots, even though the drive is formatted, the data is still there, formatting justs tell the computer that the data on the drive is supposed to be ignored and can be writter over, formatting does not destroy all data!

 

[Kodiak]

yeah, FBI can do that, but a regular application has no way of knowing it ever existed after you format the drive... that's really funny, unless you had un-formatted partitions or drives where traces of application exist.

 

[Guest]

Could this program have written data to CMOS? It somehow 'detects a previous licensing agreement', and so doesn't run.
I'm running a single physical drive with only one partition, same size before and after formatting, and yet somehow data remains.
By the way, I'm curious if anyone reading this knows how to implement "fdisk/mbr"? It doesn't seem to do anything but yield another waiting "C:>" prompt.

thanks.

 

[Guest]

Theres a great little program available called slate, which basically completely erases a hdd, File Allocation tables and all, and removes things that a std format misses, It even removed 2 bad sectors off a 4.3g Quantum that I had

 

[Guest]

I found two programs which work for IBM-DJNA hard disks (located at the IBM home page) Zip and Wipe are two little hard disk eraser programs, one for the master boot record, and the other for erasing or writing zeroes across the disk. It worked for eliminating stubborn data.

<P ID="edit"><FONT SIZE=-1><EM>Edited by boltthrower on 01/14/01 08:41 PM.</EM></FONT></P>

 

[Guest]

Like I said, running FDISK or Format does not destroy data, it just tells the hard disk that it is OK to write data on top of other data and to ignore what is there. Everyone should know this, because if you ever do anything on your computer, or any computer that you do not want anyone to know about, it can be found and recovered! The drive must have the MBR cleared and the disk need to have Zero's written across the drive to eliminate all data. The FBI and local police know this very well....